Kerosene
by deathsweetqueen
Summary: In which Caroline falls for a psychopath but has no clue, and Klaus didn't think he would be so taken in by his vampire sacrifice.


_This was my take on a season 2 Klaus and a season 2 Caroline and an unexpected meeting between the two, so, yes, Caroline will be a little OOC because she went through a completely different character development after Klaus got to her early on._

 _P.S. This drabble does contain some graphic descriptions of rape and the victim's aftermath, so please scroll past if this is a trigger for you. Oh, and there's some smut here too._

* * *

"What's a lovely girl like you doing alone in a dive like this?"

Caroline pierced the chip with her fork, shoving the morsel into her mouth, and looked up, impassively at the stranger who had taken the initiative to slide into the booth opposite a lonely, might-or-might-not-be underage girl.

Short, blonde curls, glinting cornflower-blue eyes, a red mouth that she was immediately jealous of (considering the hundreds of dollars she had been forced to shell out on good Charlotte Tilbury lipstick) and a smile that was as equally charming as she imagined it was lethal.

 _So, possible serial killer or sleazebag._

"So, which are you?" Caroline asked, curiously, voicing her doubt aloud.

Possible Serial Killer or Sleazebag raised a confused eyebrow.

"Excuse me, love?"

 _Maybe sleazebag._

"Serial killer or sleazebag?"

A hand to his heart.

She imagined he was trying to be sincere.

"That hurts my feelings, love."

Caroline's lip curled. "Not really helping your case, here."

"Can we start with a name, then?"

The gleam in his eyes had her throat burning and her fangs ready to descend, the word _predator_ registering in her thoughts. But she stamped down the primal (and she supposed, vampiric) urge to defend herself against this new entity, and her lips twitched admirably.

"Yours or mine?"

"Perhaps we should start with mine, if you're so concerned about my intentions?" Possible Serial Killer or Sleazebag said, playfully.

Caroline waved at him to continue. "Go right ahead."

"Very well," He held out a hand. "Niklaus Mikaelson. And you are?"

A laugh choked in her throat. Perhaps, vampirism and sudden memory gain turned her into a hysterical, adrenaline-junkie mess.

"I'm Caroline." She answered, almost reluctantly.

"Well, Caroline, it's lovely to meet you." There was that smile again. "So, have you decided?"

Another forkful of chips.

"Huh?" She frowned.

"Serial killer or sleazebag."

This time, the laughter spilled out.

"The jury's still out on that one." She teased.

Possible Serial Killer or Sleazebag – _sorry, Niklaus_ – sighed, long-sufferingly. "Well, I suppose I'll just have to try harder then, won't I?"

It stunned her a bit, how she had gone from eating fries, alone in some seedy bar at least two hours from Mystic Falls and Elena and the Salvatores and judgmental Bonnie and her mum and all their melodramatic supernatural shit that had resulted in her face being smashed in with a pillow until she fucking died (about which no one really seemed to care, by the way), to talking with an admittedly hot (and older) guy, who had taken the initiative to approaching her sitting alone, and begun a banter with the kind of wit that was totally lost on high-school boys.

She had two options here. She could turn him down and walk out of here and return to her lives of friends keeping secrets that could mean life or death (and, in her case, her actual fucking death), being in constant proximity with the guy that had raped and abused her for weeks before someone had deigned to help her out, and her mother being her usual, non-existent, emotionally unavailable self (oh, and she couldn't forget about hiding the whole vampire thing from said non-existent, emotionally unavailable mother seeing as she was vampire-hunting Sheriff – seriously, what was her life?).

Or, she could stay here, despite every instinct twisting in her body that the guy in front of her was no good (not in a Damon way, though, so she supposed that was something), and see what words Possible Serial Killer or Sleazebag (she had to remember to call him Niklaus) would come up with to convince her that he wasn't going to chop her up into pieces and throw her in a garbage bag, never to be seen again, and come up with something incredibly smart and witty to snap back (and honestly, wasn't that picture sounding more and more exciting?).

"I guess you will."

* * *

"You know, if anyone sees a seventeen-year-old high school girl walking around with a guy in his early thirties, you might just get arrested." Caroline teased, as the night breeze pulled her hair back.

"Early thirties?" Nik (as she was informed he preferred to be called) asked, offended.

Caroline snorted. "So, out of everything I just said, _that's_ what you had a problem with?" She asked, incredulously.

Nik smiled, slyly. "Sweetheart, is there anything about which you're concerned?"

"Well, the 'arrested' part springs to mind." Caroline said, sarcastically.

He stopped and she stopped, staring at him with intrigued eyes.

"Why do you think I can be arrested?"

Caroline frowned. "Why would I think you _couldn't_ be arrested?" She asked, suspiciously.

 _Maybe serial killer after all?_

Apparently, she did have a type after all.

She wondered if she would have enough time to flee before he pulled out the machete from where he was hiding it.

Or should she take a bite out of him, instead? Stefan (and she supposed Elena, but she was rather uninterested in what _she_ had to say right now) had made it very clear that _humans, no eating, very bad_ , but surely they would understand when she explained that she was only defending herself when a very bad man had tried to re-enact the whole Jack the Ripper fantasy, right? But, then again, she had been silently warned never to bring up the whole 'used as a bloodbag and sex doll for weeks' thing in front of Damon, Stefan or Elena because apparently it made them uncomfortable to know that one of the people on their popular table was an open-and-proud sadistic bastard (or sociopath, if she wanted to go into the psychology of it all).

But, who would need to know? She could just as easily kill him and dump his body somewhere out here, and no one would be the wiser for it. She was like, at the very least, a hundred kilometres from Mystic Falls, and no one knew that she was coming here anyway.

"I can see the wheels in your pretty, blonde head turning, love." Nik said, playfully. "But, if I may offer some advice, those fangs – as beautiful and death-dealing as I'm sure they are – you have won't quite have the effect that you imagine they will on me. May I suggest that you pursue any middle-aged man washing the stench of mediocrity off himself with a pint or four of whiskey in that bar for a snack? I'd hate to rip your heart out of your chest, not when we've only just started to get to know each other."

 _Okay, make that possible vampire serial killer_.

"Let me guess," Caroline sighed, and her heartbeat skyrocketed, _but fuck that, if I'm going to die tonight, I'm damn well going to be witty._ "You're a vampire?"

"For now," Nik shrugged. "But I foresee that will change very soon."

Caroline frowned, her brows knitted together. "I'm confused."

"It's a very long story."

"I have time." Caroline said, easily. "Unless you're planning on killing me right now."

Nik laughed. It was low and hard and it made his muscles rock with the force of it. It had been a long time since he had enjoyed wordplay with anyone, and this baby vampire with neat, blonde curls and immaculate, rose-pink gloss on her mouth, was definitely one of the best partners he had experienced in that regard.

"Oh, love, who said I wanted to kill you?"

"Well, the whole 'rip your heart out of your chest' kind of implies that, Possible Serial or Sleaze- _sorry_ , Nik." Caroline said, pointedly, ignoring his flash of amusement at the title she had given him.

Nik grinned. "That was my plan _if_ you went ahead with your attempt to kill _me_. Now that your deciding against it, there's no need for violence on my part. I've having entirely too much fun with you to ruin that with your senseless murder."

Caroline crossed her arms over her chest, tipping her jaw up at him, defiantly. "Who said I was deciding against it?"

There was a challenging undertone to her voice that had Nik's mouth quirking up at the corners with just a hint of awe.

"Well, I suppose the whole senseless murder consequence?"

Caroline sighed. "Okay, fine, why don't we go back to where we were before either of us brought up murder, okay? So, you're a vampire-but-not-a-vampire, you won't get arrested for a hypothetical sexual – and I really do mean hypothetical – relationship between us, even though it's expressly against the law – and if I'm being specific, section 18.2-371 of the Virginia Code, which is a Class 1 Misdemeanour and punishable by up to 12 months in jail, as well as a fine of up to $2500 – yes, I know the specific section of the statute and the sentence, _don't_ ask me why – and you're planning on killing me if I even try to kill you, even though you're pretty confidence that it'd only be an attempt. Did I get everything? Or is there anything I'm missing?"

Not that she could press charges against a hundred-seventy-one-year-old vampire with powers of compulsion and super strength at his disposal, but she had been curious one night after she had woken up with her heart lodged in her throat and the haunting memory of Damon's fangs hacking into her throat, blood staining her thighs, flesh and skin torn with him inside her, angry and vicious and deliberate and _fucking amused by her pain_.

"If you'll give me a moment to process your rambling, I'm sure my answer will be a yes." Nik said, teasingly.

Caroline paused, ignoring the playful slight. Yes, she was a rambler and she was damn well proud of it. It wasn't her fault that her cognitive processes worked on overdrive, while the rest of the population barely scraped by to reach the benchmark that she had passed when she was six years old and organising her Barbies by hair length and occasion.

"Don't you think it's a bit of an overreaction to kill me if you're so completely sure that I can't do anything to you in return? That is, if I even make the attempt." She asked, curiously.

Nik shrugged, nonchalantly, her disapproval doing nothing to him. "I'm hardly one for reason, as I've been told." He replied.

"Well, that makes me feel safe." Caroline grumbled.

Nik's lips twitched and he took Caroline's hand in his, the warmth of his sudden touch making Caroline swallow hard, as her heartbeat quickened. God, she felt like a middle-schooler with her crush on the guy who had his locker two down from hers. Wasn't she supposed to be beyond all of that now?

"Don't worry, love," He crooned. "You're perfectly safe with me."

* * *

A week and numerous text messages later – although, she was still a bit creeped out by how he had gotten her number – she found herself up against the wall outside her bedroom, with her legs around his hips (thank _God_ that being a Sheriff and Mystic Fall's perennial body count meant no nine-to-five job), her hair loose around her neck and clenched around his fingers.

His hands were hot on her skin, as they slid up the inside of her thighs, under the cotton-nylon of her skirt, rolling up the folds of the fabric up the length of her legs until they were bunched around her waist. It took a bit of work, but his fingers were finally pressing inside the slick between her legs, his thumb petting her clit, and Caroline tipped her head back, her lips parting. He was deliberate in his ministrations, watching her with pride and awe, as she lost herself with his fingers inside her, clutching onto any part of him she could when she feared she would slip down the wall and tumble onto the floor.

At some point, after he had wrenched her off the wall, walked her into her bedroom with her legs still wrapped around his waist, tossed her on the bed, and bore down on her, his shirt crumpled somewhere in the corner of her bedroom, she had the errant thought of whether it was wise to go to bed so soon with a vampire she hardly knew, especially considering the track record she had, but his mouth grazed the curve of her breast and instead, she was pressing him insistently against her skin.

Her fingers slipped down the lines of his abdomen, nails scraping against the muscles, all lithe and toned and strong, until they landed on his belt buckle, undoing the clasp with a flick of her wrist, her eyes snapping to his with wicked intent. He smirked back at her and looked down to watch her pull his belt out of the straps, coiling it around her palm before dropping it unceremoniously off the side of the bed. The button was undone and the zip was pulled down and her feet were rolling the folds of his jeans down his legs until they were completely out of her sight.

Nik's hands were on the hem of her top when he wrenched with a flick of his wrist and tore it right up to the neckline, cleaving it in half. Caroline lifted herself off the bed slightly to slip the scraps of material that were left off her shoulders, lamenting the loss of a top that she had adored, but it was soon forgotten as his mouth travelled down between her breasts, leaving a damp trail in its wake.

Her skirt soon met the same fate as her top and she rubbed her thighs together when his blue eyes settled on the scrap of lace between her thighs.

Caroline tilted her head up, once his hands left her skin.

"Well?" Her gaze challenged him. "Are you going to just _stare_ the rest of the night?"

"Well, I did have other things planned." Nik said, cockily.

"Then I suggest you get on with it." Caroline's head fell back against the pillow.

"Bossy." Nik murmured, his smile fond.

A slow smile curved on Caroline's mouth. "I think you like it."

Nik rolled his eyes. "I'm finding that I do."

"Okay, enough talking." Caroline grumbled, her eyes rolling up to stare at the ceiling.

Suddenly, she found her hips arching in the air of their own accord and she looked down to see Nik with his head between her legs. She scrambled to hold onto the posts of the headboard when his mouth pressed against her cunt, his tongue licking into her insistently. Her hands smacked against wood and she gritted her teeth, as her hips rocked against his mouth in involuntary motions, Nik taking his time with her.

Obviously, his skill was without fault because she was thrashing against him and shrieking mere minutes later, her orgasm pitching over her so sudden that she was almost dazed after the edge had faded from her skin. She barely had time to process before she felt herself being hauled up by his arms and deposited into his lap, her thighs locked around his waist, her feet hooking around the small of his back. Her head fell onto his shoulder, but his fingers threaded through her hair, pulling it away from her face and her head tipped back from the gentle motion, revealing her hooded, blue-green eyes to him.

His mouth was soft when it pressed against her cheekbone and with an artful roll of his hips, Caroline was gasping when she registered that he was inside her, full and fierce. His hands were low on her hips and they urged her hips to rock with his in a never-ending momentum that had her throwing her head back and biting her lip, alternating between short, breathy gasps and his name almost in a chant.

She could feel the strain in his muscles, knotted together, with her palms sliding up and down his back. Finally, her hands settled on his shoulders, her fingers slipping into the curve between his shoulder and neck. She kissed him hard on the mouth, forcing him to swallow her cry as a particular thrust struck something inside her that made her see stars. Of course, he was happy to indulge her, his hand winding into her hair, long since been reduced to wild blonde waves, and curving against the back of her skull, pressing her urgently against him.

Her nails raked bloody lines in his back and his thrusts quickened, resulting in a litany of _don't stop_ and _more_ and _harder_ , until her skin began to flush. The lines of his pelvic bone maddeningly grazed her clit with every roll of their hips together, and she gasped into his mouth. Finally, his movements became haphazard as he reached closer to his end, the way her human teeth dug into his shoulder telling him that she was in the same predicament.

His arms tightened around her and she whimpered, the rhythm they had settled between them dissolving into a desperate search for what they knew would be a staggering release. Before the thought could even occur to her, Caroline found herself convulsing around him, her vision going dizzy, her thighs spasming, and she gushed hot and wet around him. She was left in great shudders, every slight motion awakening the same shock across her skin that was both inspiring and overindulgent almost to the point of pain. The ease of his hips into hers was reckless and eager and with one final thrust and a low groan, Nik spilled himself inside her, holding her damp, quaking form against his body until the tremors had faded from him.

In a bold and surprising move from him, he pulled her hair away from her strung-out face, gazing at hooded eyes and a dark flush that he had caused, and his mouth found hers, soft and sweet.

* * *

"Well, you look like you're in need of a rescue."

She looked up to find Nik's cocky frame standing in the doorway of the trailer.

"They shot me. _In the fucking head_."

Caroline was seething.

Nik clucked his tongue. "You poor thing."

"Get me out of here." Caroline growled.

Nik's lips twitched. "You didn't say 'please'." He said, mockingly.

Caroline's hands hit the bars (of the fucking cage the dogs had put her in), furiously, and she bared her teeth at him in a snarl that only made him smile as if she were the most adorable sight he had ever witnessed.

"I'm so not in the mood."

Nik sighed. "I can see that. Baby vampires, no patience at all." He said, regretfully.

" _Get. Me. Out. Of. Here_." Caroline bit out through gritted teeth.

Nik rolled his eyes and strolled over to the cage. His fingers grazed the bars and she saw the heat slip into his gaze. It wasn't the same heat that had raked over her the night he had taken her to his bed (or hers, if she were being technical). It was a vicious cut to his eyes, wild and fierce; it was a cold promise of slaughter, at the audacity of the wolves, to keep _her_ in a cage like she was a pet they would enjoy breaking. His hands pulled once they were curled around the bars, and the metal broke with a satisfying snap, as if it were made from cardboard.

And she was crawling out, on her hands and knees, which shamed her slightly, but she was just glad to be out of the cage, that she allowed him to grasp her by the shoulders, pull her to her feet and bodily carry her out of the trailer (not bridal style, though, of course, because that would be too humiliating for her to bear).

All she could see when he drew her into the woods, were the eviscerated bodies of the wolves that had taken her hostage, their blood steeping in the ground underneath them and marking the leafage a brutal red.

Strangely, she hadn't even noticed the blood staining Nik's fingers when he had pulled her out of the cage.

Oh, well, she'd make him wash his hands with bleach before he could lay a single finger on _her_.

* * *

When Caroline woke up, her head was blurry and her vision distorted. She blinked the ache in her skull away and found herself chained, with her arms strung up above her head, crouched uncomfortably on a floor that she doubted had seen a good clean in at least a century or two, judging by the grime and stains into which she didn't really want to dig too deep.

There was a rustle from in front of her and her eyes squinted in the low light, the vague lines of another body, trussed up opposite to her, coming into view. But the body neither moved, nor said a word, so she guessed either he was still dead to the world, or a creepy voyeur. In any case, he couldn't do much for or to her. She bit her lip and leaned her head back, staring up at the shackles that bound her wrist, wondering how in hell she was going to get out of this. All she could do was hope that Nik had one of his divining moments and would come and rescue her (although, she loathed to admit her need for his assistance).

She tugged, harshly, on the chains, but still when the sound of footfalls awoke in her perception.

 _Familiar_ sharp, blue eyes surfaced in her awareness and something fierce welled up inside her.

"Seriously?" Caroline growled.

While some very small part of her had been hoping for some brave, fairytale rescue, having Nik show up _yet again_ to save her made a shriek of outrage rise in her throat.

"How the hell did you find me?" She asked, sharply.

"Well,"

She could've sworn Nik looked sheepish when he kneeled in front of her, brushing her hair away from her face.

He liked her hair _way_ too much.

"I apologise, love." Nik brushed her hair away from her face. "It seems my witch was under the misapprehension that you were to be the vampire sacrifice in breaking the curse that was placed on me by my wretched mother. He'll be dealt with, I assure you."

It took Caroline a minute to process what he had just said.

"Wait."

Realisation dawned and Caroline felt like a fucking moron. Those were literally the words that ran through her head at that moment.

"Klaus. Niklaus. _Nik_. You have _got_ to be kidding me."

The chains that held her trapped were snapped with ease and her arms fell into her lap, her fingers easing the ache in her wrists. Before she could even open her mouth to berate him, Nik had her hauled up against her body and was carrying her out of the ruins.

"Let. Me. _Go_!" Caroline shrieked, struggling against the arm that was wrapped around her waist like a steel bar, kicking her legs in the air.

"You're acting deranged, sweetheart," Nik (although she supposed she ought to start calling him Klaus – the miserable, lying bastard) sighed. "Calm down and let me explain."

" _Don't_ call me sweetheart." Caroline hissed, her hands pulling at his forearm.

"You never used to mind." He said, cockily, brushing his mouth against the curve of her shoulder, making her shudder in an instinctual reaction.

"That was before I found out you're a fucking megalomaniac." Caroline snapped.

He freed her and she rounded on him, her eyes furious.

"You so die for this." She hissed.

Nik's smile was cocky, but wavering. "I can't be killed, love."

"Well, then, I'll have a hell of a time trying." Caroline snapped. "You have exactly one minute to explain what the hell is going on here."

For a baby vampire, she definitely had the whole scary, intimidating thing down.

And she would have given him thirty seconds only, but she figured his explanation was just a little more substantial than that time limit would allow, so she decided to be magnanimous.

"Well, the thing is-"

"Funny, ten seconds have like passed, but I'm still not hearing an explanation." Caroline said, shortly.

For the first time since she had seen him enter the ruins, she could see irritation spike in his eyes.

"So, let me talk, Caroline." He said, sharply.

He very hardly called her Caroline, so she fell silent and allowed him to speak without any further interruptions.

"I did tell you the truth the night I met you in that dive." Nik said, reassuringly, approaching her with his hands outstretched. "My name _is_ Niklaus Mikaelson."

"Yeah, but you neglected to mention that you're also a thousand-year-old _Original_ vampire hell-bent on murdering one of my best friends so you can be a werewolf _too_." She bit out.

Nik raised a sceptical eyebrow that had her hackles rising. "I wasn't aware that you were so concerned about Elena Gilbert's welfare." He said, dryly.

And the thing that got to her most was that he was kind of correct. Since her transition, she had kind of placed her friendship with Elena (and Bonnie, who never quite got over the fact that her once best friend died and came back to life as a bloodsucking freak all because of a decision _she_ made in the first place, and Caroline sure as hell wasn't going to take responsibility for Bonnie's misplaced – and frankly hypocritical, in Caroline's opinion – guilt) on the back-burner. Honestly, she had been content to fall into whatever had been building up between her and Nik instead, choosing to let the Salvatores and their precious Elena go about their own business without getting involved.

Boy, was she regretting that decision now.

"That's completely irrelevant." Caroline waved off, deliberately, her face turning red.

"You just want a reason to hate me, now that you know this other shade to my identity, and you're struggling to find one because your so-called friends don't mean as much to you as _you_ think they do." Nik said, confidently.

Caroline scowled. "Don't think too much of yourself." She snapped.

"Tell me, when you friends told you about the evil Original vampire Klaus, you didn't make the connection between him and Niklaus, the vampire you met in a bar right after you were turned?" Nik asked, curiously.

Caroline shrugged. "I just thought Niklaus was some fancy German way of saying Nicholas. And pretty much every Nicholas I've ever come across goes by Nick as his nickname. So, I didn't read too much into it."

"Actually, it's Scandinavian."

"Seriously? Does it matter?" Caroline snapped.

Nik rolled his eyes. "Anyway, as I'm sure you know that my mother cursed me, binding my werewolf side, until I sacrificed the doppelganger, a vampire and a werewolf, once I was informed of Elena's existence, I decided to make my way to Mystic Falls, in order to keep a closer eye on the pieces of my puzzle. The last time I let my attention falter, Katerina – my mistake, I believe you know her as Katherine – betrayed me and I was forced to wait five centuries for the next doppelganger to be born, and I was keen to make sure that a similar mistake was not made, the last time I trusted underlings to do my work for me."

Caroline scoffed, biting down the urge to deal him a scathing comment about his ego.

"A few hours out of Mystic Falls, I stopped at a small bar off the highway, where I saw you, sitting in a both, nursing a plate of fries. There was just _something_ about you. I couldn't leave you alone. At first, I thought you might be a potential snack,"

Caroline's face tightened and Nik hastened to continue the story before his jaw ended up mottled with bruises.

"But that soon changed, once I started talking to you." Nik's eyes softened and Caroline had to look away before her insides melted. "I didn't know who you were. I wasn't aware that you had even _met_ the doppelganger until one of my underlings told me about a potential vampire sacrifice for my ritual in the form of Elena's newly-turned best friend. When I resolved not to use you as the vampire sacrifice, I was convinced that I would interfere before you were taken as my sacrifice, so I wouldn't have to tell you anything. But then my fool witch assaulted you outside the hospital and carried you off anyway." His teeth bared. "He will die as soon as the ritual is over. I don't tolerate disrespect against what's _mine_."

Caroline raised an eyebrow. "And I'm _yours_?" She asked, sceptically.

His smile sharpened and heat settled in Caroline's stomach when she turned away, hiding the flush that was vivid on her neck.

"Are you denying me, love?"

The low croon could almost be mistaken to be kind, but now that she was reconciling psychopath Klaus with morally-ambiguous Nik, she knew there to be a genuine threat behind his words.

Caroline paced, twisting her hair between her fingers in frustration, swallowing down the morbid satisfaction at his words, while Nik simply watched in silence with incalculable eyes, wondering what her response would be now that she had gotten her explanation.

"So, you were going to use me as a sacrifice in your creepy satanic ritual and I'm just supposed to be okay with that?"

"Well, in my defence, you were artfully planning my murder within a few hours of our first meeting, if you recall." Klaus said, pointedly.

Caroline grimaced, but held her ground. "Yeah, but that was like a momentary idea I had when I thought you were going to go all Jason Voorhees on me and dump my body in a lake or something. Yours was a proper, I'm-planning-the-where-and-when-and-what-I'm-going-to-do-with-her-hollowed-out-corpse kind of thing. You can't compare the two!" She argued. She cleared her throat. "So, let's say for argument's sake that I believe you and you really weren't going to sacrifice me, who's going to die in my place?" She asked, with no slight curiosity.

"Katerina."

Caroline frowned. "Wait, you _have_ her?" She asked, incredulously. Her voice rose in anger. "And you didn't _tell_ me?"

Nik shrugged. "Well, I had hoped to present you her head instead."

"Not exactly what I meant by an anniversary present." Caroline said, weakly.

"Yes, but it would knock two birds out with one stone." Nik said, pointedly. "Now, I can get rid of her in a deliciously ironic way, and her assault against you will be avenged." He said, gently.

Caroline inhaled, sharply. "Not that I don't find the idea of Katherine dying amazing, but why do I feel like this is all going to backfire on _me_?" She muttered.

Nik hummed. "Perhaps it is time you made a choice." He suggested. "You have long since outgrown the children you grew up with, sweetheart. Your loyalty no longer belongs to them. I can see it in your eyes. Tell me, if they were to learn of our… _association_ …"

Caroline rolled her eyes. God, the way he said it made it sound like they were fucking at that moment itself.

"… other than dealing you scorn, which they _will_ , will you truly be affected by their self-centred concern?" Nik finished, a hint of smug guile flickering in his eyes.

"That's not the point." Caroline bit out. "They're still my friends."

"For how long?" Nik asked. "Your sandbox friends will not last forever, Caroline. The winning side will serve you in the long run. And be rest assured, I will _always_ win."

* * *

So, Nik became a hybrid as he so wished, and Elena died and came back to life (because God forbid the laws of thermodynamics apply to Elena Gilbert). But when Nik offered to take her along with him to find werewolves that he could make hybrids as well, she bowed out, gracefully, telling him that she had turned against her friends only because she was smarter than she had been as a human. Elena and the Salvatores had delivered nothing but death and pain to her doorstep, and her mother was still beyond useless. Other than that, she had no desire to get caught up in Nik's victory celebrations and new odyssey, preferring to remain in Mystic Falls and let the drama unfold in front of her, instead of dragging her along with it.

And that was why she found herself being dragged out of a shoddy wooden chair in a dank cellar, while her father pressed a palm against his aching head after Klaus had not so ceremoniously thrown him into a wall.

"You look a mess." Nik commented, his eyes raking over her dishevelled, grime-ridden form.

Caroline scowled, cracking her muscles aching. "Well, I'm sorry, but I didn't exactly have time to put on make-up while I was being _tortured_." She snapped.

"No need to be stroppy, love." Nik said, soothingly, his hand stroking over the curve of her hip as he helped her out of the damned cellar in which she had been trapped. His head twisted and he looked over his shoulder. "Shall I kill him, then?"

Caroline bit her lip, the five-year-old who played Barbies and stared after an absconding car that never came back aching inside her. She sighed and let her weight loll against Nik, who was only too happy to brace her.

"No. Let him live."

She had nothing more to say to a man – her father – who shackled her down and watched in silence as the sunlight flayed at her skin, pretending he was doing it all for her own good.

* * *

It was after Homecoming that she finally decided to put her foot down. For someone who had been so determined to stay out of the damn drama, here she was playing Bridget von Hammersmark, once she had effectively screwed over her pseudo-friends one last time, after putting her spying skills to the test and finding out about their whole patricidal stepfather conspiracy, spilling the latter to an already suspicious Nik (she still found it odd to call him Klaus and it was easier to ignore the crap he had pulled if she thought of him simply as the mysterious vampire she met in a dive bar six months ago).

She had wanted _peace_ and he was like one of those kids who couldn't do anything without someone fucking standing right next him.

And that was why she had found herself standing on the threshold of the freaking mansion he had bought on the outskirts of the town, furiously knocking on the door. Finally, he deigned to open it and he stood there, a slow smug smile slipping onto his face that made her want to punch him in the face. He was shirtless, which was why she let her eyes roam over the lines of his abdomen and his black ink strewn across his breastbone.

And in a series of events that she couldn't decipher at all (and she still held fast to the declaration that he had conned her into it, otherwise she wouldn't have done it for him at all), she soon found herself pressing down on his shoulder, as she dug a pair of pliers into his ribcage, drawing out shards of white oak, one by one.

"I suppose you helped me because you want me to keep quiet about our little affair." Nik said, bitterly, wincing at a particularly rough pull.

"No, I helped you because I'm in love with you and I didn't want to see you _die_ , you stupid ass." Caroline shot back, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Oh." He said, lamely, looking back at her.

"Yeah. _Oh_." She said, sarcastically. She paused. "Well, are you going to say anything? Or did I make my rom-com confession to a guy who's got the emotional capability of one of those medicine cups?" She asked, sharply.

"Well," Nik rubbed the back of his neck, sheepishly, turning around to face her. "I suppose I do have that degree of emotional capability. But…"

"But what?" Caroline crossed her arms over her chest, her expression brooking no cheap excuse.

"Well, you're mine."

Caroline raised an eyebrow. "And?"

" _And_ you're mine." Nik said, firmly, as if those three words said everything he needed to say and everything she wanted him to say.

"You know what, I didn't help you break your curse, piss off my friends and my mother to the point where they practically disowned me, and tell you about the formation of the Mikael-Mystic-Falls-Gang coalition to _kill_ you dead only to be sidelined when I told you 'I love you'. I want the damn words, Nik!"

Nik scowled. "Fine, I love you. There, I said it, can we move on, please?"

"Oh, yeah, that's what every girl wants to hear when she says 'I love you' to a guy. ' _Fine, I love you. There, I said it, can we move on, please?_ '." Her voice was lowered in an imitation of his voice and accent.

Nik's shoulders slumped and she fought the urge to smile at the glower he gave her.

"I do love you, Caroline." He sighed.

"Good." Caroline nodded. There was an awkward pause. "Well, that was anti-climactic. Now what?"

"Now, we live." Nik shrugged. "My father is dead; my curse is broken. For the very first time in my millennium-old existence, I have nothing to look forward to."

Caroline wrinkled her nose. "I'm not a huge fan of spontaneity."

Nik smirked. "I've noticed." He said, dryly.

"So, what do we do now?"

"What do you want to do?"

"I thought we _just_ established that I don't like spontaneity." Caroline snapped.

"We could go to bed?" Nik offered.

"It's like ten in the morning!" Caroline protested.

"I didn't mean _that_ bed."

"Oh. _Oh_." Caroline paused. "Okay, then."

She turned on her feet and started up the stairs, leaving Nik leaning against the table and watching her with fond amusement, wondering what he had managed to get himself into.

She paused somewhere halfway.

"By the way, just because Rebekah's your sister, doesn't mean I'm going to like her or anything. She has serious issues and I have like no time for her."

"That's fine. I barely tolerate her on a good day, anyway."

"Oh, and I still have your contact as Possible Serial Killer or Sleazebag on my phone, by the way. And just because I know your _real_ name now…" Her smile was cutting. "… so does not mean that I'm going to change it."


End file.
